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What's happened to TV comedy?

I sat next to an ITV uber-Tristram a few nights ago. Trying to be helpful and not wanting to add to the obvious sum of his misery, I said: "Cheer up, it may never happen." "That's just it," he replied. "It never does. Nothing has happened; we pray for a happening."

The only thing preventing ITV from becoming a Punch and Judy show on Worthing beach is Britain's Got Talent. "Did you notice anything about Britain's Got Talent?" he inquired. Well, I try not to, but it's difficult. "Did you notice who was missing?" Normal people, people with talent, people who weren't in tears? "No," he said, "funny people." Well, that all depends on how far up the scale of behavioural malfunction you draw the funny line. "No, I mean comedians; there weren't any comedians, there never are. Thirty years ago, on Hughie Green's Opportunity Knocks, half the acts were